Hawaiian residents were briefly but intensely disturbed this morning by a state-wide alert via TV and phone warning of an incoming ballistic missile. It was,..<\/b>
\nHawaiian residents were briefly but intensely disturbed this morning by a state-wide alert via TV and phone warning of an incoming ballistic missile. It was, however, shortly afterwards confirmed to be a mistake caused by \u201chuman error.\u201d Hawaiian Senator Brian Schatz called the false alarm \u201cinexcusable\u201d and said to expect \u201ctough and quick accountability and a fixed process.\u201d
The alert went out at a little after 8 AM Hawaiian time, appearing on phones as an emergency services popup and broadcast on TV as a detailed warning of how to seek shelter. \u201cThis is not a drill,\u201d it concluded.
Authorities quickly issued followups to calm the no doubt panicking populace, but I imagine it\u2019s hard to do that properly when you\u2019ve just told everyone in the state to seek shelter and lie on the floor.
Given the current state of international relations, particularly with North Korea, it\u2019s hard to imagine how a simple human error could have resulted in such a major alert.
The \u201chuman error,\u201d of course, does not necessarily have to be one in which someone mistakenly sent the alert; the Emergency Management Agency might have received false information, or misinterpreted radar data, or any number of options. There\u2019s no indication this was any kind of hack or deliberate interference with the alert system.
I\u2019ve asked the EMA and the Senator\u2019s office for more information and will update this post if I hear back.<\/p>\n

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